Women and the Resurrection

WOMEN AND THE RESURRECTION

(Matthew 27, Mark 16, John 19,20)

Women.

A very special breed of human beings.

You can’t live with them.

You can’t live without them…

They do things and you wonder: are they mad?

You are the logical, rational one.

You see them as illogical and irrational.

And unnecessarily (and annoyingly) emotional!

So when they tell you, “We have seen the Lord: He is risen!”

You look at them and hiss: it makes no sense, you submit.

The irony is, Jesus KNOWS you are too LOGICAL and RATIONAL to believe He can rise.

That was probably why He did not show Himself to you first…

Now, Jesus just died on the cross. Joseph of Arimathea got his body from Pilate for burial. The Bible records that Joseph and Nicodemus took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth WITH SPICES (about 100 pounds weight) as the burial custom was and they laid it in the tomb (John 19:38-42). In other words, 100 POUNDS OF SPICES WAS ALREADY APPLIED TO THE BODY OF JESUS! 100 pounds of spices: that is some serious extra weight on that corpse! And after laying the corpse in the tomb, a stone was rolled to block it. “And there was Mary Magdalene and the other Mary sitting across the tomb” (Matthew 27:61).

So these women SAW that spice was already applied to the body of Jesus.

These women SAW the tomb where the body was laid.

These women SAW the stone rolled to block the tomb.

They SAW these things.

But guess what?

On the Resurrection Morning, they got more spices and went to the tomb to apply on the corpse again! Does that make sense? That aside: as they walked to the tomb, they said among themselves, “Who will help us roll away the stone from the mouth of the tomb?” So they ACKNOWLEDGED there was a problem: the stone. It had to be taken out before they could get to the body, before they could apply the spices they carried.

The strange thing about this story is, DESPITE THESE LIMITATIONS, THEY STILL CONTINUED THEIR JOURNEY!

Now, men are wired differently. If these women had told any of the disciples that morning, “we are going to the tomb to apply some spices on the body of Jesus”, the men would have queried them, “Why? But the body is already anointed with 100 pounds of spices! What difference will this extra 15 pounds you are carrying make?”

MEN ARE LOGICAL!

They would have continued, “You saw that the mouth of the tomb was sealed with a stone: how do you plan to move it? From my engineering experience, that stone is about a ton in weight: you will need a force of 20 horsepower at a velocity of 50km/ph to move it a distance of 1 meter…”

MEN ARE LOGICAL!

But the women went in their simplicity, despite being aware of the challenges before them. THEY DID NOT OVERTHINK IT!

Imagine they got to the tomb and the stone was still blocking the entrance: what would they have done? They probably would find a place to sit and start crying! And they would return to the disciples who would say, “We wonder why you went in the first place! You saw that big stone, you still went: did you think it would just roll away for you? Nonsense!”

But that was not the case. They got there and the stone was already rolled away: and the body was missing.

Mary then ran to tell Peter and John: “They have taken away the body of Jesus, we have no idea where they took it to! (John 20:1-2).

Peter and John ran to the tomb, saw it empty and went back.

Mary went back to the tomb and sat there, weeping.

She saw 2 angels in white, sitting inside the tomb who told her Jesus had risen.

Then she saw Jesus, standing by her. Thinking He was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you were the one who took away the body, tell me where you took it to SO I CAN GO CARRY IT” (John 21:12-15).

Mary wanted to go carry a corpse bandaged with 100 pounds of spices! She apparently over estimated her strength. That is how IRRATIONAL women could be.

But God HONORS their irrationality!

God HONORS their simplicity!

God HONORS their illogic!

God HONORS their tears!

When man are busy with rationality, when men are indulging in the paralysis of analysis, when men are busy with logic, when men are busy with overthinking, women are getting results!

I think men need to learn more about FAITH from women: we can be too intelligent for God sometimes…

Shalom,

Haruna Daniels